An Interesting Sunday...

Last Sunday was a deviation from the norm for us. Since I uploaded the photos in reverse order I will tell our adventures in reverse order as well. The girls had their ballet recital at 5pm. They so look forward to this night every year. They spent many hours practicing their routine and admiring the costumes they are not allowed to wear until the performance. They did a great job and so did Jack- he wasn't performing but sitting for 2hrs is quite the feat for him.





Our morning was spent planting about 100 trees in a field on the back of Elmendorf. Ken requested that we skip church and help with this project. I was so happy he is wanting to be more active it was a no brainer to say yes. We don't usually do stuff like this but we all enjoyed it- imagine that!! The field was cleared because of beetle damage to the trees. Our family planted mostly spruce trees and the other folks planted some birch. We has a great time!

A Rocky Start

May 11th was our 20th wedding anniversary and let me tell you there were oh so many people who were certain this day would never come including myself. We have been together since I was a freshman in high school.. on and off for some of those years but mostly on. We started out at the height of dysfunction-serious dysfunction- and by a true miracle have grown into a couple who can honestly say that we love and respect each other more today than we ever have.

We've had ups and downs like any other couple- probably way more than most couples- and there have been times when we have wondered if we would make it through. SERIOUSLY WONDERED!

Something magical has happened over this last year that is hard to define. I attribute most of it to the book The 5 Love Languages (thank you Lori!). Some of it has also come from going through 3 very difficult years, making it through, and becoming better people than we were before the storms began. A willingness to look at our weaknesses and doing the work to change those things was also instrumental. Eternal thanks to Elder Johns who changed our lives in more ways than he'll ever know.

I spent a lot of years trying to change Ken into the person I thought he should be. I wish I would have realized sooner that accepting him and loving him for the man he is and the man he will grow into would make us both happy. I believe that as women we do not respect the men in our lives as much as we should. I now know that when I am putting Ken first and his feelings first my needs still get met. He doesn't require very much to be happy and I am on the receiving end of good things when he is happy and fulfilled.

Now that we know each other's love languages it is so much easier to fill up each others buckets. It really becomes effortless because when your own bucket is full you want to give to the other person.

When I look back on all our years together I'm so grateful that neither one of us gave up- at the same time anyway! We do have a few co-dependent issues- thank goodness!! I know we will have hard times again but it isn't so scary to me now because we are in such a good place and we now have the tools to keep us there.

My husband is a good man and I didn't always give him enough credit for that. I'm grateful that he loves me as I am and is willing to stick around for this crazy little life of ours!

My Beast

We celebrated Jack's third birthday today. I've taken to calling him My Beast and for those of you who know him you know why. He is seriously delightful while at the same time being maddeningly mischievous.

He currently likes to ask you if your are happy, angry, sad etc. I always tell him to look at my face and guess... he does a good job with that.

He is riding his little motorcycle big wheel around the neighborhood when we go for our daily walks. It is very funny to watch him cruising along.

His smiling face melts my heart although you'll probably not see it for awhile since he's taken to smiling like some kind of freak during pictures!

He takes great joy in chasing his sisters around with objects to hit them with. That is why he got a baseball mitt and balls but not a bat for his birthday.

He is still sleeping with us most nights. I was feeling pretty bad about this until Ken told me he kind of likes him sleeping with us. He is the baby of the family for sure:)

Finally, this little beast of mine talks incessantly.. I can't imagine where that comes from!!